Three RiversHudson~Mohawk~SchoharieHistory From America's Most Famous Valleys

Philip Schuyler and the Growth of New York, 1733-1804

Chapter Three, The Revolution Breaks

New Colonial Protests 1773-1775

Tea kindled a flame in the colonies and set ablaze the social,
economic, and political framework into which Schuyler had worked himself and
which he was beginning to enjoy. In May 1773 Parliament passed a "Tea
Act" to rescue the East India Company from bankruptcy. The law provided
remission of duties on tea exported to America, but retained an import tax
of three pence per pound in the colonies. The company's privilege of selling
tea directly to consignees, and the drawbacks on the duties, enabled it to
undersell colonial merchants, including smugglers. Americans felt it was an
odious monopoly. Furthermore, was not the three pence a fax on Americans,
granted without local legislative authority? When the New York Assembly met
in January 1774, the province was not yet disturbed by the impending arrival
of tea ships, nor did the Boston tea party in December 1773 have a discernible
effect. Perhaps this was due to Governor Tryon's pledge not to use military
force to land tea in New York. In any case, when the assembly dutifully voted
the regular appropriations for the operation of the government, Schuyler was
absent, perhaps to avoid controversy, or perhaps because of illness or personal
business. The Yorkers made a gesture of protest to the Tea Act by naming a
new committee of correspondence to collect and relay news of intercolonial
agitations. Scarcely had Governor Tryon embarked for England in April 1774
than the arrival of vessels carrying tea caused renewed excitements. When
radicals resorted to extralegal tactics such as popular meetings and committee
maneuverings they threatened the assembly oligarchs, who were hard put to
control or lead them. Finally, on April 22, Yorkers had their own tea party
and assemblymen began to attend public meetings to choose a committee to form
a nonimportation program against Great Britain, but this was too mild for
the radicals who wanted absolute nonimportation of all British goods.

Partly to satisfy Massachusetts' requests for total nonintercourse,
and partly to avoid a hasty and unpalatable decision, conservative Yorkers
supported a proposal for a Continental Congress, hoping it would remove the
explosive problem from their immediate responsibility. All the assembly factions
hoped to avoid the embarrassment of definite commitment to radical demands.
At a public meeting, New Yorkers chose a committee of 51 to arrange the election
of delegates to a Continental Congress. Other more radical elements, namely
a committee of mechanics, offered candidates for delegates, but the more cautious
committee of 51 won wider support in the colony. There is no indication that
Philip Schuyler openly participated in the extralegal movement; indeed, he
pled illness as the reason for not accepting election as a congressional delegate,
but his role in the January-April 1775 session of the assembly revealed his
position: it was not to break up the empire but to make a determined protest
to the British government for its interference in local liberties.

Intercolonial Affairs

The First Continental Congress assembled in Philadelphia in
September 1774. Its actions soon forced colonists to choose between Britain
and America. Among these actions was a declaration that Britain's disciplinary
measures (called the Intolerable Acts) against Massachusetts for the Boston
Tea Party and other disorders were unconstitutional. One act closed the port
of Boston until restitution was made for the lost tea; another altered the
Massachusetts charter by increasing the governor's powers of appointment;
others provided for trials outside the colony of persons accused of crimes
in enforcing Parliament's laws, and for billeting of troops wherever the presence
of the army was required. The Congress called for open disobedience of these
acts, for forming and training militia, and for economic sanctions against
Great Britain. The sanctions, known as the Association, included nonimportation,
nonconsumption, and nonexportation measures against British trade. Persuaded
that such measures had caused Britain to repeal the Stamp Act, the colonists
hoped again to get their way through economic pressure.

When the New York Assembly convened in January 1775, it was
faced with decisions on whether to endorse the acts of the Continental Congress
and to send delegates to a second congress if the British government refused
to back down. Disputes over these and related matters followed the old factional
lines, with assemblymen fighting a battle of words over the temper of the
language to employ in seeking redress. Schuyler's forces failed to get the
assembly to consider the proceedings of Congress, to thank the merchants and
citizens for their support of nonimportation, or to elect delegates to a second
congress. Although they agreed with the De Lanceys on the need to define grievances,
Schuyler's forces, like their rivals, sought to distinguish themselves from
their opponents. Both sides were moderate as they played a waiting game while
Massachusetts and Virginia led the more radical forces.

It was at this point that Philip Schuyler supported the more
radical faction which advocated sending delegates to the Second Continental
Congress and electing a New York provincial convention. Enough others joined
him in the maneuver to carry the point. When the New York Provincial Convention
met on April 20, Schuyler was in attendance. The Convention provided for the
election of a provincial congress to supersede the assembly and selected Schuyler
one of the delegates to the Second Continental Congress. Other delegates included
James Duane, Philip and Robert R. Livingston, and John Jay, men neither radically
patriot nor strongly loyalist. They were instructed to consult with other
delegates on ways of preserving and reestablishing American rights and privileges
and of restoring harmony between Britain and the colonies. Schuyler believed
that if Congress and the colonies resorted to arms, it should be only to defend
well-established rights. His hostility was aimed at British ministerial measures
and also against "their wretched Sycophantic abettors" - the De
Lanceys. Factionalism and political principle had so commingled that it is
difficult to distinguish between them as determinants of patriot and loyalist
positions.

The Second Continental Congress

From the beginning of his attendance in the second congress
in May 1775, Schuyler was drawn into the work of military resistance which
had begun at Lexington and Concord in April. He served on committees to organize
the war effort and when Congress started to appoint generals Schuyler was
among its first choices. It was felt that one of the ranking commanders should
be from New York, and that he be wealthy and well connected in order to assure
his faithful performance of duties and the surrender of military power when
the crisis ended; thus the New York Provincial Congress reasoned when it recommended
Schuyler for the post. He became a major-general on June 15, and was given
command of the Northern Department, which included New York and Canada. As
a civilian his appointment reflected American concern that the military should
be firmly subordinated to the civil authority, a point on which New Englanders
were almost hysterical. And as they feared military despotism, Schuyler's
military attitude and penchant for discipline and rank caused serious difficulties
with Yankees whether in Congress or the army. Yankee fears were baseless because
Schuyler believed that after the rights of Englishmen were restored, Americans
should return instantly to peaceful pursuits. Also, Schuyler's concern for
private property reflected a valued tenet of Anglo-Saxon law to which many
of his fellows were devoted in their quarrel with the imperial government.
Schuyler's radicalism extended only to a redress of grievances. His conservatism
prompted him to hope for a speedy return to honorable and peaceful pursuits.